We are happy to announce the keynote speakers to the conference: Professor Inger Birkeland (Norway), Professor Per Högselius (Sweden) and Associate Professor Geci Karuri-Sebina (South Africa). Welcome to Turku in June 2026!
Inger Birkeland
PhD, Professor
Department of Culture, Religion and Social Studies, Faculty of Humanities,
University of South-Eastern Norway, Norway
Inger Birkeland is Professor of Human Geography at the University of South-Eastern Norway where she teaches nature-society relations, people-place relations, and education for sustainable development at the BA- and MA-programs in teacher education and culture studies.
Her research has since 2005 been focusing on strengthening the cultural sustainability of post-industrial communities Rjukan and Notodden, and supporting the empowerment of children, youth, and civil society. Recent book is “Multivocality in World Heritage: Rjukan-Notodden Industrial Heritage Site, Norway”, edited by I. Birkeland, S.F. Johannessen, G. Nordby and B. Richards, and published by Routledge, 2025
Professor Birkeland will give her keynote speech in the Futures Conference with a title: ”Imagining sustainable futures: Narratives of place in heritage-making”.
Per Högselius
PhD, Professor
History of Science, Technology and Environment
KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden
Per Högselius is Professor of History of Technology at KTH Royal Institute of Technology. He holds an MSc degree in Engineering Physics and a PhD in Innovation Studies.
An interdisciplinary scholar, he focuses on transnational aspects in the history of technology and this field’s intersection with environmental, economic and cultural history. Much of his teaching and research gravitates around energy systems, infrastructures and extractivism in past and present.
Recent works include The Nuclear-Water Nexus (MIT Press, 2025, with Siegfried Evens), Gräv upp, hugg ned, pumpa ut: Människan och naturresurserna under 5000 år (Historiska Media, 2025), and Neutrality’s Empire: Swedish Colonialism in the Industrial Age (Berghahn Books, 2026, with David Nilsson and Hanna Vikström).
Professor Högselius will give his keynote speech in the Futures Conference with a title: ”The Future of Extractivism: Navigating Planetary Boundaries, Wicked Problems and Geopolitical Turmoil”.
Geci Karuri-Sebina
PhD, Associate Professor: Digital Governance
Wits School of Governance
ICESCO Chair for the Study of Innovation and Futures in Africa
Director, Tayarisha Digital Governance Research Group
Coordinator, Civic Tech Innovation Network
South Africa
Geci Karuri-Sebina is a scholar-practitioner currently serving as an Associate Professor at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, and the ICESCO Chair on Innovation and Futures in Africa. She is affiliated with the Wits Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, Tayarisha Digital Governance Research Group, the MIND (Machine Intelligence & Neural Discovery) Institute, and the Civic Tech Innovation Network. Geci also serves as Organisational Architect with Dancing With Mountains; Adjunct Professor at the African Centre for Cities; a Principal at the School of International Futures; and a Director with the Southern African Node of the Millennium Project.
Her work spans the fields of anticipation, innovation and governance, grounded in her interest in the intersections between people, place, time and technological change. She also holds editorial roles in several leading journals in the fields of futures and innovation. Geci has Bachelors degrees in Computer Science and Sociology (Iowa); Masters degrees in Architecture and in Urban Planning (UCLA); and a PhD in planning and innovation studies (Wits University). She is a Desmond Tutu African Leadership Fellow.
Associate Professor Karuri-Sebina will give her keynote speech in the Futures Conference with a title: ”More than North Futures, More than South Possibilities”.
Sustainability, Temporalities and Futures 